


Tonight Will Be Fine

by hauntedjaeger (saellys)



Category: Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: Bechdel Test Pass, Bisexuality, Canon Compliant, Developing Relationship, F/F, Femslash, Polyamory, Post-Movie
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-22
Updated: 2014-12-22
Packaged: 2018-03-02 19:48:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,805
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2823932
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/saellys/pseuds/hauntedjaeger
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Three times Mako Mori met Naomi Sokolov, and one time she didn't.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tonight Will Be Fine

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ienablu](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ienablu/gifts).



> Ien prompted for post-Pitfall Naomi, Mako, and/or Raleigh and marked it gen, but mentioned that an exploration of how shared Drift memories affect romantic/sexual interest would not be taken amiss. I was ALREADY TOTALLY GOING THERE. Thanks for giving me an excuse to finish this story!

In the Drift, boundaries fade. Sharp-edged memories melt as if in a forge, pool together, cause cognitive dissonance. (Mako Mori, Yancy Becket, and Raleigh Becket, all age ten, play marbles together.) Neural connections are redrawn. (That dress did not belong to her mother.) Faces and names--these are fluid. (What color are Jaz’s eyes? What does her voice sound like?)

In Tokyo on January 23rd, 2025, Mako does not immediately recognize the name on the roster of journalists. She doesn’t immediately recognize the woman who takes a chair across from her and Raleigh and sets a little recording device on the table. (How many Jaeger flies did Yancy Becket forget?)

“Ranger Becket; Ranger Mori,” the woman greets them. “Thank you for making time for me. How does it feel to be back in Tokyo?”

Mako draws a breath, opens her mouth to answer. Naomi Sokolov’s eyes meet hers.

(Mako has never been in the cab of a PPDC jeep in a dubiously romantic spot in the hills overlooking the lights of Kodiak. She has never felt Ms. Sokolov exhale against the side of her neck.)

She blinks and it’s gone; absently, she wipes the fingers of her right hand on her trouser leg, even though they’re dry. Raleigh sees this. It’s not until he winces--an infinitesimal flinch of his shoulders, not something anyone else would recognize as a signal of mortification--that Mako realizes what happened.

“It feels wonderful,” Mako says, and she talks about the changes, the rebuilding, about visiting Coyote Tango’s berth in the hangar. Her voice is even, and her face is still. This is particularly important because of Ms. Sokolov’s clear eyes, which search Mako’s face, catch the most minuscule of changes in her expression, and file them away.

“I’ve been in a few decommissioned Shatterdomes,” says Ms. Sokolov. “There’s something almost sacrosanct about the emptiness, like the echoes of all those people are still there.” Mako glances at Raleigh, who watched her while she spoke as if she is the only thing in the universe. They know all about echoes. Ms. Sokolov goes on, “There isn’t a country in the world that would tear theirs down. Does the Jaeger program have plans to keep using them?”

They happen to know, and happen to be cleared to reveal to the press, that the Tokyo ‘Dome is going to become a research station. This becomes an exclusive for Ms. Sokolov, by virtue of the fact that no one else has asked.

To close the interview, Naomi Sokolov asks them both about their plans for the future--individually, which makes her an anomaly among the press they’ve met on the victory tour. Mako will continue working with Tendo and Doctor Gottlieb to design the Mark-6 Jaegers. Raleigh has no idea. He’s been thinking about a cabin somewhere, or a farm. Goats, maybe.

Ms. Sokolov shakes their hands, starts to walk out of the room, and then pokes her head back in and tells Mako happy birthday. Mako thanks her.

“God, I’m sorry,” Raleigh drawls miserably as soon as the reporter is gone. He runs his hands over his face. “I didn’t even think about it.”

“It’s okay,” Mako tells him. “I can see why you both liked her.”

(“Invite your brother next time,” Naomi said as she climbed down from the cab. Shit, he fucked up. He fucked up.)

“Look, all of that…” Raleigh never slept with Ms. Sokolov, like it would matter. He was a teenager. It’s in the past. If Mako required reassurance, any of those would do.

“I know.” He still looks so uncomfortable that she has to smile. She waits a beat. “Is she still into pilots?”

He looks at her, smile spreading slow. “I can see if Tendo has her number.”

Mako holds up the white slip Ms. Sokolov pressed into her hand. “She left me her card.” This is not the first time they’ve had the same taste in women. 

The smile is a grin now. “Guess she’s still into pilots.”

\-----

The last active Shatterdome in the world has a coffee bar, and the coffee bar has a few very nice tea sets which Marshal Pentecost left to be distributed among the staff, and this way everyone gets to use them. Mako meets Ms. Sokolov here over a steaming pot of ryokucha in what used to be Crimson Typhoon's bay, and Naomi sets her recorder on the table. "Tell me about the work you're doing here."

"We have four new Jaegers in the earliest assembly stages--it will go faster when Kodiak is back online. We're developing the next generation of firmware and screening pilot candidates."

It’s four months after Pitfall. This morning she pinged Raleigh. _Ms. Sokolov is visiting the ‘Dome_. She imagined his expression, eyebrow rocket at full. That kept a smile on her face as she geared up to weld.

 _GODSPEED_ , he pinged back from Sydney. He and Herc are there for a suit-and-tie thing, the sort for which Mako will never be as fit as Raleigh is. He is more patient in his persistence; also white, male, and American, the three most important qualities to have in funding negotiations. 

At no point since she arrived in Hong Kong this morning has Ms. Sokolov asked where Raleigh is. Most of the press can scarcely believe Mako is capable of existing without him. 

"I understand the Nova Hyperion crew are first in line for a Mark-6."

"They're the only surviving pair with more than four kills to their name," Mako explains, and ignores the reporter's shrewd look. "Still sharp in the simulator, too."

"What about the surviving pilots who aren't paired? Surely their experience is too valuable to keep them out of the program. Are any of them Drift compatible with the new cadets?"

They both know she's talking about Marshal Hansen, and they both know how compatible he is, with everyone. Mako dips her head. "Possibly, but getting a vet back into a Conn-Pod after they've lost their copilot... it takes some special circumstances." 

For just a second, Ms. Sokolov's gaze goes through Mako. Haltingly, she reaches forward and pauses the recorder. "I know you know," she says softly, "but I don't want to know how much you know." 

Mako glances around the coffee bar, half full between shifts, and wonders who else knows any of it. Fortunately, if Shatterdome staff wanted to mock anyone for their sexual history, they'd have to start with almost every Jaeger jockey, and by the time they worked their way down the list to Tendo Choi they'd probably be tired of trying to shame unshameable people. "We're adults, Naomi." 

Ms. Sokolov looks at Mako like she doesn't miss anything, and she really doesn't. She starts the recorder again. For the time being, that is that. 

\-----

It is thirteen months after Pitfall and it's snowing in Cambridge. Mako has a window seat in a pub that serves adequate tea, and while she waits she splits her attention between the view of an old, old city getting blanketed in white and the progress bar on her phone. She's sending Raleigh a video of Ada Gottlieb learning to crawl, with Dr. Gottlieb's wry voice commenting in the background that she has her mother's swagger. 

 _Help,_ Raleigh pings back,  _I'm drowning in cute._

_You still want one?_ _  
_

_Well, I'm not gonna steal theirs, but a breed of child, Ranger Mori--_

Mako looks up when the door swings open and admits a swirl of white flakes along with Ms. Sokolov. The reporter spots her, waves, orders a cider, removes scarf and gloves and coat on her way over. She sits across from Mako, and Mako looks at Ms. Sokolov's folded hands on the tabletop. 

There's no recorder. Mako realizes abruptly that Naomi only asked if she had time to talk. She didn't say she wanted another interview. 

"How was the walk?" Mako says, and Naomi meets her eyes, and for the first time, she looks nervous.

"It was..." Naomi takes a breath, and lets it out with a tangle of words. "I lied. I wasn't doing a story on campus, I was doing one in London, and I caught the first train when I heard you were here." 

Mako's confusion is interrupted by the arrival of cider. Naomi looks away, takes a fortifying swig. "Feels like I'm lying to myself," she mutters. 

The question she doesn't ask: would they be in the same place right now if it weren't for the memories Mako has in her head of something she never did?

Mako has spent the last year untangling the parts of her that haven’t changed from the parts she can find in the Drift when she needs to. There were times when she thought she was lying to herself, times when she thought the things she wanted would require sacrifice the way they had before, so she pushed good things away.

"If you're here because you want to be," Mako says, and this is the best answer she can come up with on short notice, "nothing else matters."

Naomi's eyes search Mako's face, and then they talk. Mako explains her and Raleigh, which is fairly exclusive information, but this is off the record and it will put Naomi at ease to know. Naomi explains that with her work schedule, assignments in every corner of the world, she doesn't have much time for relationships, and anyway she moves slow; that's just the way she's mellowed with age.

They talk to reach an understanding, but really Mako thinks the understanding was always there, and it has nothing to do with the memories she carries. (She knows what not to do, because they were the things Naomi liked then, and she can, when given the opportunity, find new things Naomi will like.) 

They talk until Naomi really does need to catch her train and turn in the day's work, and Mako did not pack enough layers on this trip and Naomi gives her an extra one for the walk to the station. The train pulls in and Mako looks at Naomi's face, and she's going to let Naomi set the pace here, she's learned how to do that, but then Naomi is leaning in and her lips are soft and sweet and Mako knows that part of the reason this feels so good is that she already knows the taste, but they're both here because they want to be. 

She gets back to Hong Kong and Raleigh meets her on the helipad, eyes the purple cardigan she wears. "Is this new?" he says, touching the collar, and he tries to hold back but the smile takes over his whole face. 

"Just a loaner," Mako says, and she puts her arm around Raleigh's waist and he puts his around her shoulders, and they go inside. 


End file.
